The Wolf Gift (53 page)

And so they feasted together in the soundless rain.

Afterwards, they lay at the base of the tree together, motionless, Felix obviously listening, waiting.

Who could have told the difference between them, beasts of the same size and color as they were? It resided in the eyes.

Critters sang of the fresh kill, the carrion. Slithering through the underbrush an army of tiny mouths moved towards it, the bloody carcass shivering as they assaulted it, as if in being devoured it had taken on a new life.

Out of the deep shadows came the coyotes, huge, hulking, gray, lethal-looking as wolves with their pointed ears and snouts.

Felix appeared to watch, a great silent hairy man being with patient but glittering eyes.

He crept forward now on all fours and Reuben followed.

The coyotes yelped, danced back, snapped at him, and he at them, taunting them with his right paw, laughing under his breath, growling, allowing them to move in again, and teasing them again and then watching them as they tore at the broken body of the elk.

He made himself so still they grew bolder, drawing closer to him, then shying violently at the sound of his laugh.

Suddenly he sprang, pinioning the largest with his paws, and clamped its wolflike head in his jaws.

He shook the dying animal and tossed it to Reuben. The other coyotes had fled in a chorus of cries and yelps.

And they feasted again.

It was almost dawn when they descended the cliff, clutching, sliding, and scampering over the slick rocks to the entrance of the cave. How small it seemed, near invisible, this seam in the thick rocks, a broken narrow cavity hung with gleaming moss and foaming with the lapping tide.

They walked together through the cave, and Felix changed back into the man without ever breaking his stride. Reuben found he could do it too. He felt his feet shrinking, his calves contracting with every step.

They dressed together in the murky light, the clothes soiled and torn, but all they had, and Felix threw his arm around Reuben, his fingers stealing affectionately through Reuben’s hair and then clasping the back of his neck.

“Little brother,” he said.

These were the first and only words he had spoken since they went out together.

And they went up into the welcome warmth of the house and to their separate rooms.

Laura stood at the bedroom window, staring out at the steel-blue dawn.

T
HE DINING ROOM ONCE AGAIN
.

The fire was built high and roaring under the black medieval mantel, and the candles flickered and smoked down the length of the table, amid platters of roast lamb fragrant with garlic and rosemary, glazed duckling, steaming broccoli, Italian squash, heaps of unpeeled potatoes, artichoke hearts tossed with oil, and roasted onions, freshly sliced bananas and melon, and hot freshly baked bread.

The wine was red in the delicate stem glasses, the salad glistening in the big wooden bowls, sharp sweetness of the mint jelly as delicious as the aroma of the succulent meats, and sweet butter smeared on the hot rolls.

The company came and went from the kitchen, all hands helping with the feast—even Stuart who had laid out the old linen napkins at every place and straightened the silver, marveling at the size of the old knives and forks. Felix set the bowls of sugared cinnamon-almond rice on the table. Thibault brought the platter of bright orange yams.

Margon sat at the head of the table, his long thick brown hair loose to his shoulders, his burgundy-colored shirt open casually at the neck. His back was to the eastern windows and the not-uncommon sight of a reporter or two out there prowling in the tangled oaks.

The early afternoon light was white but very bright through the thick, twisted web of gray branches.

All were seated finally, and Margon called for a moment of thanks, and bowed his head.

“Margon the Godless, thanks the gods,” whispered Felix with a wink to Reuben who was once again opposite him, and Laura who sat beside him smiling, but Felix closed his eyes and so did all of them.

“Say what you will to the force that governs the universe,” said Margon. “Perhaps we’ll call it into being, and it will yet love us as we love it.”

Again, the silence, the sweet incessant patter of the rain slowly washing the world clean and nourishing it, and the logs sputtering and spitting as the flames danced against the darkened bricks, and a soft distant music emanating from the kitchen—Erik Leslie Satie again, the piano,
Gymnopédie No. 1
.

Oh, that humankind could make such music, thought Reuben, on this tiny cinder whirling in a tiny solar system lost in a tiny galaxy hurtling through endless space. Maybe the Maker of all this will hear this music as a form of prayer. Love us, love us as we love You.

Stuart, seated between Felix and Thibault on the other side of the table, in a white T-shirt and jeans, began to cry. He crumpled, his face hidden in his enormous hand, his large shoulders heaving silently, and then he went still, his eyes closed, and puckered, tears spurting as if from a little child.

His curling blond hair was tied back, away from the bones of his large face, and with his short broad nose and the ever-visible sprinkling of freckles, he looked as he so often did like a large little boy.

Laura bit her lip and fought tears watching him. Reuben squeezed her hand.

And a grief took hold of Reuben, but it was mingled entirely with the happiness that he felt. This house, so full of life, life that embraced all that had happened to him, all that had frightened him and at times almost defeated him, well almost—this life was straight from his wordless dreams.

Margon looked up, the moment of silent prayer ended, taking in all those seated with his eyes.

The party came alive. Platters were passed, more wine poured, butter slopped on hot steaming slices of bread and light flaking rolls, the scent of garlic rising from the tumbling, sliding spoonfuls of salad, and great forkfuls of meat slapped onto the old flowered china plates.

“So what am I to offer you?” said Margon as if they’d been talking all the while, instead of attending to a thousand unimportant yet essential things. “What am I to give you to help you with this journey that you’ve begun?”

He took a deep gulp of the sparkling water that stood beside the empty glass for the wine he didn’t drink.

He took a heaping portion of the hot broccoli and green squash, and
even more of the artichoke hearts, and tore off a hunk from a hot buttered roll.

“The basic things you must know are these. The change is irreversible. Once the Chrism has taken hold, you are Morphenkinder, as we call it now, and that can never be undone.”

Stuart woke from his tears just as quickly as he’d given into them. He was eating such enormous chunks of lamb that Reuben feared he might choke, blue eyes flashing at Margon as Margon went on.

Margon’s voice was as agreeable and almost humble as it had been the night before. He was a man of persuasion and subtle power, his light golden brown face very plastic and expressive, black eyes rimmed in thick black lashes that gave a drama and an intensity to his expressions that seemed more fierce than his words.

“Never in all my existence,” he continued, gesturing unconsciously with the silver fork, “have I known someone who truly wanted it reversed, but there are those who rush headlong into perdition as the result of it, driven insane by the lust for the hunt, and scorning every other aspect of life until they are destroyed by the weapons of those who hunt them down. But you needn’t worry about this. You are not, any of you”—his eyes took in Laura as he said this—“of the sort to be so foolish or such spendthrifts with the gifts of fate.”

Stuart started to ask something but Margon gestured for silence.

“Allow me to continue,” he cautioned. He went on:

“The Chrism is almost always passed by accident. And it can only be passed by us when we are in the wolfen state. However, my mind, my limited mind, my mortal mind, is haunted by a grim legion of those to whom I refused it and I restrain myself no more. When one is worthy, and one asks, I give the Chrism. I ask only an ardent and informed desire. But this you—Reuben and Stuart—must not seek to do—offer the Chrism, that is. The responsibility’s far too great. You must leave such fateful choices to me, to Felix, to Thibault, even to Frank and Sergei who will be joining us soon.”

Reuben nodded. Now was not the time to press him on Laura, but did it even need to be done? There had not been the slightest suggestion that Laura was not already one of them, and this, in Reuben’s mind, had to mean one thing. Yet he did not know and it tortured him. He did not know.

“Now the Chrism can prove fatal to the infected one,” said Margon, “but this happens very seldom and usually only with the very feeble or the very young, or those who are so severely bitten or otherwise injured that the Chrism can’t overtake the injury and the loss of blood. What I know I know from happenstance. It can kill, but in the main it does not—.”

“But Marrok said that it could,” said Reuben, “and it almost invariably did.”

“Forget Marrok,” said Margon. “Forget what others might have told Marrok to try to curb his desire to fill the world with Morphenkinder like himself. We will say our own Requiem when we dance in the woods soon, together; enough on Marrok for now. Now Marrok knows or does not know because no one knows. And we can’t know which it is.”

He stopped long enough for a bite of the duck, and another chunk of the buttered roll.

“Now when the Chrism is given to young men or women your age, there’s no danger,” he said, “and when it’s given with the deep bite, injecting the Chrism directly into the bloodstream at many points, well, it acts as it did with you, in about seven to fourteen days. The moon has nothing to do with it. Such legends have a different origin and nothing to do with us. But it’s undeniable that in the first few years the change comes only after nightfall, and it is extremely difficult to induce in the light of day. But you can, after a while, if you are very determined, induce it anytime that you like. Your goal should be complete mastery of it. Because if you do not have that, you will never be in charge of it. It will be in charge of you.”

Reuben nodded, murmuring that he had found that out in the most painful and fearful and personal way. “But I thought it was the voices that made me change,” he said. “I thought that the voices triggered it and had to trigger it—.”

“We’ll come to the voices,” said Margon.

“But why do we hear the voices?” asked Stuart. “Why do we hear the voices of people in pain and who are suffering and who need us? My God, I was going crazy in the hospital. It was like hearing souls in hell begging for mercy—.”

“We’ll come to that,” said Margon. He looked at Reuben.

“Of course you worked out how to control it as best you could,” said Margon, “and you did well. You did extremely well. You’re a new generation
and you have a strength we never saw in the past. You come to the Chrism with a health and vigor that was only occasional for centuries, in fact, exceptional. And when this is combined with intellect, the Morphenkind is nothing short of superb.”

“Oh, don’t flatter them both too much,” Thibault mumbled in his familiar baritone. “They’re exuberant enough.”

“I want to be perfect!” shouted Stuart, jabbing his thumb at his chest.

“Well, if you would be perfect as I see perfect,” said Margon, “then evaluate all the gifts you possess, not merely the Morphengift. Think about the threads of your human life and what they mean to you.” He turned to Reuben. “Now you are a poet, Reuben, a writer, a potential chronicler of your time. This is a treasure, is it not?” Without waiting for a response, he continued, “Last night, before I took this young one into the woods, I talked at length with your father. He is the parent who has given you your greatest talents, not your brilliant mother whom you so devoutly adore. It’s the man in the shadows behind you who has endowed you with the love of language that shapes the very way you perceive the world.”

“I don’t doubt it,” said Reuben. “I failed my mother. I couldn’t be a doctor. Neither could my brother, Jim.”

“Ah, your brother, Jim,” said Margon. “Now that is an enigma—a priest who longs with all his heart to believe in God, but does not.”

“Not so rare at all,” said Reuben, “if you ask me.”

“But to knowingly give one’s life to a God who might never answer?” asked Margon.

“What God has ever answered anyone?” asked Reuben. He fixed on Margon and waited.

“Need I point out that thousands have claimed to hear his voice?”

“Ah but do they really hear it?”

“How are any of us to know?” asked Margon.

“Oh, come now!” said Felix, speaking up for the first time. He put down his knife and fork and scowled at Margon. “You’re going to hedge on religion now with these boy wolves? You’re going to soft-pedal your own nihilism? Why?”

“Oh, forgive me,” said Margon sarcastically, “for acknowledging the abundant evidence that humankind from the beginning of recorded history has claimed to have heard the voices of its gods, that conversions are generally quite emotional and real to the convert.”

“Very well,” said Felix with a little genial gesture. “You go on, Teacher. I need to hear these things once again myself.”

“I don’t know if I can bear it,” said Thibault sonorously with a little mocking smile.

Margon laughed under his breath, eyes sparkling as he looked at Thibault. “It was a dark day when you joined this company,” he said, but this was entirely in a convivial spirit. “Always so bitterly amused, always so droll. I hear that droning bass voice in my sleep.”

Thibault enjoyed this.

“Your point’s clear,” said Felix. “Reuben’s a writer. Perhaps the first Morphenkind who has ever been a writer—.”

“Oh, nonsense, am I the only one with a memory for unpleasant things?” asked Thibault.

“It’s not the chronicle of the Morphenkinder I want to reveal here,” said Margon. “I am saying this.” He looked pointedly at Stuart, who was reaching again for the potatoes. “You are creatures of body and soul, wolfen and human, and balance is indispensable to survival. One can kill the gifts one is given, any of them and all of them, if one is determined to do so, and pride is the parent of destruction; pride eats the mind and the heart and the soul alive.”